Supreme Council of Royal Arcanum v. Churlo

263 F. 755, 1920 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1281
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedFebruary 28, 1920
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 263 F. 755 (Supreme Council of Royal Arcanum v. Churlo) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Supreme Council of Royal Arcanum v. Churlo, 263 F. 755, 1920 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1281 (E.D.N.Y. 1920).

Opinion

GARVIN, District Judge.

This case is submitted upon an agreéd statement of facts. Complainant is a mutual benefit fraternity, incorporated under the laws of Massachusetts, having been engaged in and authorized to carry on the business of such a society in the state of New York for many years.

In April, 1901, Reuben Crowell Hallett became a member of a subordinate council of complainant, located in the city of New York; there was issued to him a benefit certificate for $3,000, in which his wife, Lenora Hallett, who is the defendant Lenora Hallett Churlo, was designated as beneficiary, which certificate he at once delivered to her, and which is in her possession. In June, 1915, she obtained a final decree of absolute divorce against him in the state of New York.

Up to the granting of the decree she paid the dues and assessments upon her husband’s membership in the complainant, amounting to the sum of $729.78, out of her separate estate; thereafter, and up to the time of his death, such payments were made by him. Hallett died September 9, 1916, a member in good standing of the said subordinate council of complainant. No change or revocation of the beneficiary was made, nor was there any desire for either. There were no ehil- [756]*756' dren. The defendants William P. Hallett and Russell B. Hallett are the next of kin of the deceased.

When the benefit certificate was issued, the statutes of Massachusetts, by chapter 442 of the Acts of 1899, sections 5 and 11, provided as follows:

“Sec. 5. The corporation may prescribe by its by-laws the manner in which and the officers and agents by whom the purposes of its incorporation may be carried out, and, instead of the directors and other officers named in section 4, it may have trustees or managers and presiding, financial, and recording officers, with similar powers and duties.”
“Sec. 11. Any corporation duly organized and transacting business under this act, which conducts its business as a fraternal society on the lodge system, or which limits its certificate holders to a particular order, class, or fraternity, or to the employees of towns, cities, the commonwealth, or the federal government, or of a designated firm, business house or corporation, may make provision for the payment of benefits in case of death, or for both death benefits and sick or disability benefits. The funds from which the payment of such benefits shall be made shall be derived only from, assessments collected from the members, except as provided in this section and in section 14 of this act. The fund from which the expenses shall be defrayed may be derived from a per capita tax, dues or expense assessments. Such provisions, funds, assessments and payments shall be as required and provided for in the by-laws of the corporation. Such death benefit shall be payable only to the husband, wife, affianced husband, affianced wife, child by legal adoption, parent by legal adoption, relatives of, or persons dependent upon the member named in the benefit certificate: Provided, however, that in any instance where a benefit certificate has been issued in accordance with the above provisions and the beneficiary therein named and the husband, wife, affianced husband, affianced wife, child, child by legal adoption, parent, parent by legal adoption, or persons dependent upon the member named in the benefit certificate have all died, the member with the consent of the officers of the corporation, and under such rules as they may prescribe, may have the certificate transferred to any other person: And provided, further, that the benefit certificate shall, in effect, provide that if the death of the member therein named shall occur when one full assessment on each member would not amount to the face sum of the maximum certificate of such corporation, then the amount paid the beneficiary thereunder shall not exceed the amount of such full assessment or the proportionate part thereof which said face sum named in such certificate bears to such maximum certificate, but this restriction shall not apply to a corporation which confines its membership to the permanent employees of towns, cities, the commonwealth, or the federal government, nor to a corporation having an emergency or reserve fund until such fund shall have been exhausted.”

At the same time, and continuing to Hallett’s death, except the parts inclosed in parenthesis, which were amendments duly made during Hallett’s membership, sections 330 and 324 of complainant’s by-laws provided, among other things, as follows:

“Sec. 330. If at the time of the death of a member, who has designated as beneficiary a person of class second, the dependency required by the laws of the order shall have ceased, or shall be found not to have existed or if the designated beneficiary is his wife and they shall be divorced upon the application of either party, or if any designation shall fail for illegality (death of beneficiary) or otherwise, then the benefit shall be payable to the person or persons mentioned in class first, See. No. 324, if living, in the shares and order of precedence by grades as therein enumerated, the persons living of each precedent grade taking in equal shares per capita, to the exclusion of all persons living of subsequently enumerated grades, except that in the distribution [757]*757among persons of grade 2nd tlie children of deceased children shall take by representation the share the parent would have received if living, (and except that in the distribution among persons of grade loth only those who are next in kinship to the deceased member shall take.) If no one o£ said class first shall be living- at the dentil of the member, 1ho benefit shall revert to the widows’ and orphans’ benefit fund.”
“Sec. 321. A benefit may bn made payable to any one or more persons of any of the following classes only:
“Cla$s First.
“Grade 1st. Member’s wife.
“Grade 2d. Member’s children, and children of deceased children, and member's children by legal adoption. .
Member’s grandchildren. “Grade 3d.
Member’s parents, and member’s-parents by legal adoption. “Grade 4th.
Member’s brothers and sisters of the whole blood. “Grade 5 th.
Member's brothers and sisters of the half-blood. “Grade Gill.
Member’s grandparents. “Grade 7th.
Member’s nieces and nephews. ■ “Grade 8th.
Member's- cousins in the first degree. “Grade 9th.
Member's aunts. “Grade 10th.
Member’s uncles. “Grade 11th.
Member’s next of kin who would he distributees of the personal cátate of such member upon his death intestate. “Grade 12th.
“In either of which cases no proof of dependency of the beneficiary designated shall be required: but in cases of adoption, proof of Hie legal adoption of the child or the parent designated as the beneficiary, satisfactory to the Supreme Secretary, must be furnished before the benefit certificate can be issued.
“Glass Second.

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Bluebook (online)
263 F. 755, 1920 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1281, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/supreme-council-of-royal-arcanum-v-churlo-nyed-1920.